Identifying & Dating Old Photos: Mystery Photo 1

This evening I participated in an excellent webinar by Maureen Taylor, Photo Detective, on the subject of Identifying and Dating Family Photographs. It has really motivated me to get back to work on an album containing photographs of my Lowe ancestors in Coupar Angus, Scotland, which a cousin shared with me last year. See Every Picture Tells a Story for the background. Of the 96 photographs in the album, only 26 have so far been identified.

 

 

I have decided to start with this full length portrait of an unknown man because it has details of the photographer on the reverse:

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Here is what I know so far, set out under headings suggested by Maureen's webinar:

Provenance of Photograph

From an album belonging to Dr John Lowe (1849-1925), and his wife, Annie Willie Cowpar. The album was subsequently taken to Canada by their son, Major Robert Lowe (1882-1955). It is now in the possession of one of his daughters, my third cousin, once removed, from whom I obtained a digital copy.

Type of Photograph

Paper print, common in England from 1858 to 1914.

Photographer

Thanks to Photo London, I know that Alexander Lamont Henderson, born in Edinburgh in 1838, had a studio at 49 King William Street, London Bridge, from 1860 until November 1887. His son gave his photographic library to the Guildhall Library in November 1907. Alas, it was destroyed during the Blitz in 1942. Otherwise I could simply have looked up the print number in the library.

Internal Evidence

The painted window, looking out on a country scene, was popular in the late 1860s.

Costume

A number of features suggest the first half of the 1860s:

• Loose fitting suit
• Peg top trousers, wide at the top and tapering to a close fit at the ankle
• Dark jacket worn with light trousers
• Shoes neither square-toed nor pointed

Genealogical Research

Most of the photographs in the album were taken in Scotland. This one suggests someone who was living in London. Between 1863 and 1872, George Lowe (1819-1915), worked in London as an engineer, first at Woolwich Arsenal and later at St Pancras. He was aged 44 to 53 during this period, which fits with the age of the man in the photograph. I have a photograph of George Lowe taken in 1902, when he was 83. Comparing the two photographs, there would seem to be a similarity in the eyes, nose, mouth and ears:

 

 

Add up all the Clues

The evidence so far suggests that this may be a photograph of George Lowe, taken when he was working in London during the 1860s.

Next Steps

George Lowe and his family emigrated first to Canada, in 1872, and then to the USA in 1873. I am in touch with one of his descendants in the USA, my fourth cousin. I shall email him to see if he, or his relatives, have any photographs of George Lowe.

John McCarthy: A taciturn giant in Canada

Last November I took out a subscription to the US newspaper website Genealogy Bank. I did so as part of my search for Captain John Winn. I haven't found him yet but the subscription has paid for itself in an unexpected way. It seems US newspapers in the early 20th century were fascinated by the workings of Scotland Yard and I have found many articles which mention my great grandfather, John McCarthy.

 

 

Last night I came across a real gem - an article written following John McCarthy's appointment as Superintendent in charge of CID at Scotland Yard in 1912. It appeared in The Times-Picayune of New Orleans, dated 18 October 1912, in a gossip column with the extraordinary title: "Gossip Of Europe. Marquise De Fontenoy's Budget of Old World Celebrities".

After paying tribute to John McCarthy's predecessor in the job, Superintendent Froest, the article goes on to describe the new appointee:

 

 

I shall have to ask my mother, who lived with him as a child, whether he was really "a giant in stature and strength" and "exceedingly silent and taciturn". The latter seems an unlikely description of any Irishman.

The information about John McCarthy accompanying the Prince of Wales (later George V) on a tour of Canada was new to me. It adds yet another dimension to my family's relationship with the country of which I have recently become a citizen.

 

 

Good old Wikipedia provided me with a detailed itinerary, in an article on Royal tours of Canada:

As modern modes of transportations allowed for easier travel across the oceans, more of the Royal Family came to tour the King's northern Dominion. The first since Queen Victoria's death was the son of the reigning king, Prince George (later King George V) and his wife, the Duchess of Cornwall and York, who arrived in Canada in 1901. The royal party – which consisted of 22 people, including the Duchess' brother Prince Alexander of Teck – landed at Quebec City on 16 September, from where the group then travelled to Montreal – where separate Francophone and Anglophone welcoming committees caused confusion – and then on to Ottawa, where the Duke watched the lacrosse final for the Minto Cup, which he enjoyed so much he kept the ball that was used. They then shot the timber slide at the Chaudière River, watched canoe races, and picnicked in Rockcliffe woods, near Ottawa. They passed through Ontario, creating "incredible excitement seldom seen since the visit of his father in 1860." Amongst other duties, the Prince dedicated the Alexandra Bridge in Ottawa, in honour of Queen Alexandra.

The Duke and Duchess moved on to Manitoba where the former opened the new science building at the University of Manitoba, and then to Regina in the Northwest Territories. In Calgary, they met with First Nations chiefs and viewed exhibitions. Westward, they ended up in Vancouver and Victoria, to turn back again towards Banff, where the Duchess went to Tunnel Mountain and Lake Louise while the Duke went to Poplar Point. After passing back through Regina, they reunited in Toronto, welcomed by the Mendelssohn Choir, and attended concerts at Massey Hall. It was then around southern Ontario and back to Montreal again, where the Duke opened the newly rebuilt Victoria Bridge. The tour ended with a trip through Saint John, Halifax, and then out of Canada to the then still separate Newfoundland.

I also found on YouTube an old film of the royal party in Montreal and Quebec. Unfortunately, I cannot spot John McCarthy in any of the footage but, no doubt, an important part of being a royal bodyguard is to be discreet and keep out of the limelight.

 

John McCarthy's youngest daughter, Sheila, was born on 30 September 1901, whilst he was away in Canada with the royal couple. I don't suppose that made him very popular with his wife, my great grandmother, Agnes McCarthy nee Fritz. Sheila was given the second name Mary - hardly surprising in a good Catholic family - but I wonder whether it may also have been in honour of Princess Mary, with whom he was travelling when the baby was born.

A Genealogist's View of the 2011 Census

This afternoon I filled in the 2011 Census forms online for our household and that of my 91 year old mother. The actual census date is 27 March 2011 but you can fill in the information online now and save it, then go back and make any necessary changes on the night of 27 March, before finally pressing Submit.

These are my thoughts on the process, as a citizen and a genealogist:

• It is much easier to fill in the online form than the paper one, with its daunting 32 pages.
• The form only asks for one first name but I filled in all our first names, for the sake of future genealogists. The online form only allows a limited number of characters, so I only had room to enter the last initial for my husband, who has three Christian names.
• The form asks for place of birth at country level only. If you use the paper form there is nothing to stop you writing the actual place of birth next to this box. The information will then be recorded for future researchers. (According to Annie Barnes at Hibbitt Family History, digital copies of the forms will be preserved.) This is quite important if your name is a common one.
 

 
 
• The question which made me really stop and think was the one about national identity, where you are allowed to tick multiple boxes if you wish:
• I am a citizen of the United Kingdom and, as a diplomat and civil servant, have served the whole country in my work in Whitehall, at international conferences, and in British Embassies overseas. I see myself as British and would hate to see the break up of the United Kingdom into its component nations.
• I feel this even more strongly because my ancestry is a mixture of all the different nationalities of these Isles - English, Scottish, Irish and Welsh. When I go to Scotland, in particular, I feel my ties to that country very strongly, having traced my ancestry there back to the 16th century. I never want to have to show a passport at the border.
• On the other hand, I was born and raised in England, have lived nowhere else in the UK, and I supported England against Scotland in the rugby this afternoon (we won 22-16). I feel that England should enjoy the same autonomy and self-government as the other constituent nations and strongly object to their MPs voting on purely English affairs in Parliament. I also hated the militant "anyone but England" attitude of some Scots during the World Cup. As a result, I feel more English identity and nationalism now than at any previous time of my life.
• I decided that my recent acquisition of Canadian citizenship, backdated to birth, as one of the generation of Lost Canadians, was a complication too far for this particular exercise.
• In the end, I ticked both British and English.

Wordless Wednesday - The Ark, Prince Rupert, BC

 

 

The house in Prince Rupert, British Columbia, Canada, where my mother was born in 1919. For obvious reasons, it was known to the family as "the Ark".

 

UPDATE

 

The legendary Cyndi Howells asked me why the house was built that way. As taught by Cyndi herself, I did a targeted Google search on "Prince Rupert" +houses +stilts. Up popped a result from Google Books - an article from Popular Mechanics magazine dated July 1922. It contains another photograph of the house:

 

 

The article explains that:

The city of Prince Rupert, BC, is situated on very hilly ground, and in some instances houses were built before the grading operations were completed, which has led to many unusual sights. In one case a house was built with the first floor level with the street, but the ground was so far below the street level that it was necessary to support the basement on long timbers. A narrow wooden bridge leads from the sidewalk to the first floor of the house.

As it happens, I have a photograph of my grandmother, holding my mother in her arms, standing on that narrow wooden bridge:

 

 

I think this story illustrates three important genealogy lessons:

1. Sharing your research in a website or blog leads directly to new discoveries.
2. There is a good reason why professional genealogists like Cyndi teach us to ask the "who, what, where, when, why" questions about our research.
3. It is simply amazing what you can find on Google Books.